Photo: Yolanda Suarez
defunkt theatre
September 20, 2007; closes October 13, 2007
There’s out there. There’s way out there. And then there’s defunkt. The fourth and final installment in Wellman’s crowtet gets a gorgeously composed and textured production here. defunkt thrives on the non-linear, the unexpected, the downright askew. And thank goodness for that. They are unusualists. Moorman particularly magnetic, then disappears!
7 comments:
I was thrilled by this production. defunkt creates an effective dreamscape with surprisingly minimal lighting and set ~ eccentric characters are skillfully played by cast as I’ve never seen them, with peculiar vocal cadences and humorous physical tics. an awesome time, though not your typical night at the theatre, unless you typically attend surreal pseudo-musicals crafted with imaginative language. like watching an opera in a foreign tongue I didn’t always understand what was being said (rogatory??) but I was intrigued. I’m seeing it again! ~~heatherrose
Yeah, Tom Moorman was absolutely fabulous, then never seen again after the first scene....oh that wacky Wellman. But even Tomless, this is an amazing production in so many ways. There was one song I could have watched all night -- the one Ben Plont fronted, with the rest of the company in two rows behind him -- with gorgeous (and uncredited?) movement. Spellbinding work by all involved.
Mead, I assume the movement was by director Sarah Jane Hardy since she is also a (quite talented) choreographer.
the movement was actually generated in rehearsal by the cast, with Sarah Jane telling us what to keep and when to find something new. as it was such a collaborative part of rehearsal, we decided not to credit it in the program.
(Paper Moon, however, was choreographed by Sarah Jane, who is indeed quite a talented choreographer!)
I really enjoyed it -- particularly the great commitment to character specifics, lighting, direction, musical numbers. I'm not always a fan of shows that seem to aim to confuse but this struck, to me, a perfect chord of followable-plot, interesting confusion (I was confused, never felt the performers were less than certain and commited), and utterly enjoyable musical entertainment.
saw this production back in Sept. Extremely impressed by the level of commitment from everyone in the ensemble. Solid production and must be seen by all. Congrats to everyone at defunkt!
To this day, I continue to want to be a static tube.
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